KCMeFlickr

This is the kind of picture that shows up on Flickr at times.  Weird.  Abstract.  An image you don't expect.  Jeffery City, Wyoming.  Out in the middle of no where.  Today, the wind was tame as I pulled a U-turn on the deserted highway to go back and grab this image.  Note the past affects of the wind - the chairs tossed over, a piece of metal piles up against the car.  The country has little to hold back the wind. It is a force as viable as the four seasons.

I ran into a friend at Moran, stopping there for a candy bar and bathroom break - both needed for the long road trip ahead.  He was aghast that I was driving to Denver.  With a face screwed up in disbelief, he exclaimed, "couldn't they fly you there??"  I pondered this comment all the way up the sunlit Togwotee Mountain and down to the other side, rolling the posted 30 mph speed limit into Dubois, my town of Wyoming origin. 

Turns out, I like to drive.  I like to drive across this vast, open state.  Pronghorn antelope dot the sagebrush landscape.  Rivers are frozen white along the edges.  There is no snow after one descends down the 9600 foot Togwotee Pass country.  The roads weave through seams of rocks pushed up in lines of reds and browns.  A sheep wagon sits alone out in the middle of the range.  Cows gather to feed down a line of hay delivered by an unseen rancher.  Horses keep their tails to the wind and browse brown dried up range grass.  A windmill sits frozen in the day's wind.  Golden eagles feast on road kill, giant-sized compared to the ravens they stand alongside in the ditches and borrow pits of the two lane asphalt highways. 

Usually when I am tasked to make this jaunt across the Cowboy State, I go straight south to Pinedale then Rock Springs, pick up route 80 and head to Cheyenne.  Today, graced with blue skies, (mostly) dry roads, and a sense of adventure, I chose the Togwotee Pass/Lander/Rawlins route.  Lander has a very good grocery store.  I bought a bag of food to keep me awake; carrots, celery, a container of fruit. 

Turning south from Cheyenne, the wide open spaces begin to funnel in with increased traffic.  Suddenly it is big city.  I ponder the ability of Google Maps to take me right to my motel here in a suburb reportedly ten minutes from my fire investigation class on tomorrow's docket.  How did we ever get anywhere without this amazing technology? 

Books on tape usher me across the state.  I finished the book Captivology and started A Man Called Ove .  Michael read this book.  I could tell how much he was moved by the book and now eleven chapter in, I see why.  It is a wonderful story.  Makes the miles go by, keeps boredom at bay, and entertains!

Tomorrow I go to learn.  I am optimistic the day will be worth the two days of driving.